Full configuration of DHCP and other network services

Bocaboy, my estimation is wire could be close 100 ft long but considering 20 year old house and potentially inferior quality of wire used by builders may be causing t-mobile gateway to not recognize an orbi router on the other end. What you are suggesting seems to be logical reasoning behind issue I was facing.

Thanks for all the inputs!

Rich, is it possible the cable in the wall exceeds 300 ft.? If so, that would be the problem. Ethernet is limited to 300 ft. before it would have to plug into a switch for another run. The Orbi might be able to make sense of it, but not the T-Mobile gateway, especially if it's a run close to the maximum Ethernet cable length.

Bocaboy, I don't want to put it in AP mode so that I can use parental controls.

I took out orbi rbk50 from junction box and plugged in a different ethernet cable directly to WAN port of orbi from arcadyn instead of using wire going inside the walls of my house to the junction box, and it resolved my above issues. 

I am not sure why using the pre wired ethernet cable going inside the walls was causing these issues and I was using same cable for orbi satellite for backhaul without issues. Probably that cable goes through some switch or something that causes the issues?

But with plugging another short cable directly to orbi works and everything is looking good right now including parental controls.

Rich, check that the Orbi isn't acting as a DHCP server. There can only be one DHCP server on a network, and the Arcadyan KVD21 5G gateway's DHCP can't be disabled. If you can set the Orbi up in Access Point mode, you'll probably have better luck with it.

I am facing issue where I keep Orbi mesh router in Router mode as I use parental controls, and there is no internet detected by Orbi on WAN port on Orbi web admin screen when I connect it to Arcadyan.

Interestingly, if I select 'available via Orbi' Wi-Fi in android phone's available WIFI connections for Orbi router, device gets 192.168.12.x IP address and it works fine, but when I select regular Orbi Wi-Fi, device gets 192.168.1.x IP and no internet is available on it.

So somehow Orbi is giving out 192.168.12.x IP to some devices even though Orbi is in router mode!

Is this due to double NAT or IPV6 or something that is beyond my basic networking understanding?

I see all devices given 192.168.1.x IP address by Orbi in admin UI, but I also see some devices given 192.168.12.x IP address in Arcadyan android app devices tab for the devices that can get internet through Orbi.

I have not disabled Wi-Fi on Arcadyan and not sure if that contributes in any way to my issues.

Any inputs on my situation are highly appreciated.

Hello folks, I'm another technical user, with RF experience and telecom background, along with IT and electrical engineer >20yrs. I went looking for PLEX and KVD21 remote access, that may be the only bust but it is what it is. I had tried out the trashcan device, and returned it after getting ATT fiber. BUT now ATT is doing the "bait and switch" with promo expired and "no promotions currently available" game. Similarly with Spectrum (cable), but I lose power frequently in my neighborhood and that kills the cable signal (regardless of home UPS/generator). ATT has a similar issue but they at least have some kind of UPS setup (so fiber is active during brief power outages). Have to use their huge device (BGW320-505); it's better than previous models and does Wifi6 (802.11ax). My issue is needing internet during power outages (ring doorbell!).
Great current deal on device, in addition, they have a promotion for $100 gift card for new service from 11/10/2022 - 1/11/2023.

I just wanted to let everyone know that T-Mobile is running a promotion of $25 Home Internet FOR LIFE as a Xmas special. Since I'm a new user, I qualified for this discount. If the savings over Xfinity were good before, they're even better now!!

https://tmo.report/2022/12/t-mobiles-best-holiday-deal-25-per-month-home-internet-for-life/

Part of my thinking is how much bandwidth do I really need. With Xfinity, I have 800 mbs, but the truth is that I don't really "see" that bandwidth in performance gains. Yes, it's a bit snappier, and downloads take place faster, but other than that, I'm leaving a lot of change on the table in terms of bandwidth.

Although I'm retired, I still do a fair amount of beta testing for Apple. Downloading a new build will definitely take a couple more minutes. When I look at streaming, something my wife and I do every day, I don't see a bit of difference between T-Mobile and Xfinity. Both are error-free and allow me to watch what I want, including Plex. The only thing I haven't tested is Zoom and Facetime, two apps that I use somewhat regularly.

I'm going to give it to Friday and then make my decision. As I said before, if I had to make that decision today, I'd continue with T-Mobile and hope that I haven't made a mistake My area is not rural, but I am still limited to AT&T (DSL), Xfinity and the solution I'm using with T-Mobile. I'd be willing to say that in my immediate neighborhood, Xfinity is the major provider and that almost no one is even aware of OTA wireless as a connection option.

As always, thanks for all the input and experience. It is much appreciated!

The main reason I brought up the heat as if you do try to use the attic you know it gets hot up there in the summer time and the gateways do act up when there is too much heat. Just a reminder.

Your prize level is rather conservative but I do get it. If there is greater load on the tower then there is throttling so that bandwidth can become very limited with a 20-30% throttle on the traffic due to user load. When there is congestion and cell phone activity is higher then the gateways have less priority so the dynamics of the behavior become a bit more unexpected for end users. 

I hear you on the savings each year. I avoided the others due to contracts and prices 2X what I could get with T-Mobile. Actually our only options here due to rural location were HughesNet or Skylink so it was a no brainer. The fact that there is no contract and we can discontinue the service at any time without penalty is a big win. The drawbacks to HughesNet are obvious as well for service quality for the amount of money. Not an option. Skylink is a huge up front investment and 2X the monthly costs at least so that was not going to happen. The T-Mobile solution here in rural east TN has been pretty solid other than a couple of periods of unrest for 4-5 days each. When they bumped the cell from n71 to n41 that was a big win. It pretty much doubled our download speeds and the upload is improved as we got the B66 LTE vs the B2 which is slower. So, you really want a bit of head room if you can get it. Sure what you are getting now seems pretty great for the cost but when the winds of change blow that can be diminished in seconds so a bit extra bandwidth, even if you seldom use it, is welcome. I can download a movie from Netflix in 30 second most of the time. Downloading the content to watch it when you want is a good plan. If the bandwidth is available and you know it will be less during peak time when you might want to watch a show having the content downloaded is a big win and makes it a much more pleasant viewing experience as you don't encounter the spinning doughnut. I hope it works out for you as yes the savings each year is a big win.

Ive been monitoring the heat output of the gateway for the last couple of days and it is at best, warm to the touch but certainly not hot. The gateway itself is behaving as I expected other than settling on 4G LTE rather than 5G.

Having said that, I don't want to take my eyes off the prize. If I can maintain the speeds I'm seeing with speedtest, I'm a happy camper. I'm getting anywhere from 37-52 mbs which is more than sufficient to run two streaming TVs simultaneously and keep all the gadgets connected and operating. T-Mobile will net me a savings of $240 annually and, hopefully, far fewer outages. I guess my hope is that 5G will continue to be expanded and that this technology will improve over time. For now, I am really happy with the performance, albeit somewhat surprised.

As I said before, I'm not going to cancel Xfinity for a week so I can be reasonably sure that the T-Mobile solution will work.